Las Animas, Huerfano DA faces 29 misconduct claims

DENVER — The state office that investigates misconduct of attorneys is accusing the district attorney of Las Animas and Huerfano counties of 29 instances of serious misconduct.

The alleged misconduct involves the handling of criminal cases by him and other prosecutors on his staff, including a murder case that the district attorney dismissed.

The accusations against District Attorney Frank Ruybalid were filed Aug. 21 by the Colorado Supreme Court’s Office of Attorney Regulation Counsel.

The office’s 67-page complaint claims that Ruybalid at least from 2010:

Repeatedly disobeyed orders of judges in Trinidad and Walsenburg.

Intentionally and repeatedly violated a state court rule that requires prosecutors to provide potential evidence and information that might favor defendants to attorneys for defendants before trials.

Hired inexperienced prosecutors for key positions, whose actions in court sometimes were incompetent, and failed to train and supervise them.

The complaint cites several examples of Ruybalid or his subordinate prosecutors dismissing cases against criminal defendants when judges threw out evidence due to the prosecutors’ misconduct.

Ruybalid, for example, dismissed a murder case against Scott Kibitt last October after a judge decided there had been “willful misconduct by the prosecutor’s office” and sanctioned the prosecutor for the misconduct by limiting evidence he could use against Kibitt.

Ruybalid may be put on trial by the Supreme Court’s attorney disciplinary judge on the Attorney Regulation Counsel’s allegations that stem from the office’s 11-month investigation.

Ruybalid, through a Denver-area attorney representing him, has not yet filed a response to the complaint. The Pueblo Chieftain did not receive a response Friday from Ruybalid to a request for his comments.

The attorney regulation office’s file of its investigation includes a ruling a year ago by state District Court Judge Leslie Gerbacht in Trinidad that states: “It is blatantly clear . . . there is a pattern of blatant disregard (for the rule at issue) and a blatant disregard for orders issued by this court as well as other judges in this district by Mr. Ruybalid’s District Attorney’s office. The only conclusion this court can come to is willful misconduct by the prosecutor’s office.”

The report of the regulation counsel’s investigations states that two defense attorneys who were interviewed said Ruybalid’s violations of the rule “do not appear to be willful, (but rather) as the result of an excessive caseload, and lack of proper funding and staff for the (DA’s) office.”

The regulation counsel is asking that Ruybalid be “appropriately disciplined” by the attorney disciplinary judge.